Picking up the Pieces
by AllTheseFeels
Summary: When Kaidan finds out about Shepard's one-night stand with Jacob after their encounter on Horizon, he goes to Shepard looking for answers. Unsurprisingly, two opinionated soliders and ex-lovers in the same room are quick to start an argument. Rated M for the odd bit of language, could probably get away with a lower rating but better to be safe than sorry. :


**A/N: So yeah, another FemShep/Kaidan oneshot. I didn't actually romance Jacob with any of my Shep's, but I thought about the situation and thought 'Hm, I really think Kaidan would be a bit more hurt and angry about this'. So, this was the ultimate result. Enjoy. **

**FemShep/Kaidan**

**Picking Up The Pieces**

Kaidan had had enough. He needed answers from Shepard and he needed them now. He barely said a word to anybody as he left the mess hall, completely oblivious to a bewildered James Vega asking him where the fire was. Completely ignorant of anything else but Shepard, he shuffled impatiently in the elevator and he must've pressed the button to take him to the Captain's Cabin about five times. He felt his biotics crackling and lashing out at the air around him; tinging it a translucent blue as his fists impatiently clenched and unclenched. The door couldn't slide open fast enough. He hammered on the door with an agitated hand and grimaced as he exerted slightly more force than he'd intended. Hopefully Shepard wouldn't notice the dent.

"Who is it?" She called from the inside. "I'm busy and I'd really rather you didn't punch a hole through my door. I'm sure it's pricey to replace,"

Kaidan flushed and ran a hand through his hair. She knew it was him; he could tell.

"It's just me, Commander," He called to her, his voice rigid and uncertain. "I need to talk to you and, quite frankly, your mission report can wait,"

He waited for a moment – quite possibly the longest moment of his life – as he heard shuffling coming from the room. For a moment he doubted she was going to let him in at all but just as he was about to turn away the lock on the door turned green and a familiar hiss flooded his ears as it smoothly slid open. He hadn't stepped foot in this new cabin until now. It was completely different to her modest quarters on the original Normandy; everything was so lavish and the massive fish tank cast a permanent aquamarine glow over the entire room. A quiet, acoustic track floated out of her sound system and he couldn't help but notice that her bed had not been slept in; the corners of the sheets were still tucked neatly under the mattress and the pillows looked as though they'd just been purchased. Kaidan made a mental note to scold her about her lack of sleep later. For now, though, he had a fairly large bone to pick with her. Of course, Shepard had to get the first word in. He'd grown accustomed to that now; the first and last words to every debate they had were always hers.

"Well, Kaidan?" She quirked an eyebrow expectantly. "I sincerely hope whatever you've disturbed me for is as important as you made it sound,"

"Actually, it is," He replied probably a little too quickly but there was no turning back now. "I need answers, Shepard. About Cerberus, about you…About what happened while we were apart,"

"Kaidan, I swear to God," Shepard snarled as her eyes lit up in an emerald fire. "If you question my motives or my morals ONE more time I—"

She cut herself off as she threw her arms in the air in frustration, stalking down the steps and sitting down on the edge of her bed. Probably the most she'd used it in a long time, Kaidan mused.

"What else do you WANT from me? I cured the goddamn GENOPHAGE, let one of my best friends DIE to save the race of another. Mordin shouldn't have had to die, dammit! I should've been in that tower, it should've been ME that had to sit there and watch as everything crumbled around me. If you're going to stand there and ask for more proof than that, I think you—"

Kaidan held a hand up to silence her and begrudgingly felt his face soften. He'd forgotten that she'd given up just as many things as she'd acquired. Nevertheless, he couldn't falter now. He just couldn't. This problem had been keeping him up at night more than his migraines ever had.

"Enough, Shepard," He surprised himself at how stony he sounded. "Let me talk. I was talking to Javik earlier and he was talking about how all of the previous crew members left a 'residue' behind them. He talked about a Krogan being where he was now, a mercenary living where Diana is now. He also mentioned something about your cabin; that there was someone else sleeping here at one point,"

Shepard's eyes fixed onto his face and it was then that he knew that Javik had not been lying. He could see guilt written all over her face and it felt as though she'd just torn his heart out of his chest and crushed it under the heel of her boot. His breathing became shallow and almost laboured as he fought with himself to keep talking. He wanted to walk out on her then; just leave so he didn't have to look at her anymore, but this needed to be done. He needed some kind of explanation or at least a sense of closure.

"He talked about a man but couldn't give me a name; a Cerberus soldier. Apparently you helped him lay his past to rest and you apparently were very quick to try and forget ours. I expected a lot of things from you while we were apart, Shepard, but this—"

She cut him off before he could finish. His tone was rising and rising until he was close to shouting and she would not stand for it. She moved as quickly there as she would on any battlefield – for this, truthfully, was a battlefield in itself – and rose from her bed to slap him across the cheek. Hard. The cracking noise reverberated around the whole room as Kaidan just stood there; frozen in shock. She'd been angry at him many times before but never had she struck him. There were no tears in her eyes; she was a military woman at heart, never cried. All he could see was rage and pain and copious volumes of hurt that seemed to stretch into forever. Her hands were quivering at her sides as she clenched her jaw, shaking her head at him in disbelief. He couldn't speak, so she did.

"I cannot…BELIEVE you," She hissed through gritted teeth. "You gave me that huge spiel on Horizon about how you'd managed to move on after I died. How I'd changed and that I wasn't the Shepard you used to know. If that wasn't a hell of a way to say 'we're done' then I don't know what is! Jacob was THERE for me. I didn't sleep with him because I loved him! He didn't love me either; you saw him yourself! He's expecting a CHILD now, Kaidan. Forgive me for seeking a bit of comfort when you made every effort to absolutely crush me. What was I supposed to do? Sit there and pine for you while the Collectors were out there abducting thousands of innocents? Hell, no! You made it quite clear that you'd gotten over me so I figured it was HIGH time I got over you,"

She took a deep breath and he watched as the rapid rise and fall of her chest steadied into slow, controlled huffs. Kaidan reached a hand up to touch at his cheek, wincing to find that it was very, VERY raw. He said nothing yet but dared to take a step towards her and was slightly irritated with himself to find that he was slightly proud of the fact that he towered over her.

"Shepard—"

"It's COMMANDER Shepard, actually,"

Kaidan visibly recoiled, feeling every part of him ache at her words.

"No," He suddenly called out with more decisiveness than he truly felt, grabbing her firmly by the arms. "I'll call you Shepard because that's what you TOLD me to call you way back when all of this started. If even just to SPITE you, I'll call you Shepard. You are the single most stubborn, infuriating, adamant, self-righteous woman I have EVER met. You rush into the middle of a firefight if it means the civilian caught in it has a chance to escape. You want to put yourself in the place of dead comrades because you feel like you're unworthy of surviving. You're selfish, Shepard! Selfish, selfish!"

That was when Kaidan lost it. His biotics flared and pulsed in agony as Kaiden hung his head, a single tear sliding down his cheek and dripping off his chin. Both of them trembled; one out of despair, the other shock.

"You…You're the only one that can stop the Reapers and you still think you deserve to die," Kaidan continued. "You don't get that luxury, Shepard. The whole galaxy needs you. You can't duck out now. You rush into these dangerous situations with no thought for not just your own life, but the feelings of others if that life were to be cut short. You're selfish for not caring about yourself, you're selfish for wanting to give up, you're…You're—"

"I'm selfish for cheating on you," Shepard finished, causing Kaidan's head to jerk up in shock. "That's what you want to say, isn't it? Go on, say it! Say it so you can get the hell out of here!"

That was when he saw it. Commander Shepard, the most talented soldier in the galaxy, had been reduced to nothing before him. Without her shields, armour or weapons she stood there defenceless against his onslaught. She pulled her arms free from his grasp and brushed past him as she made her way back to her desk, throwing herself into the chair and trying to busy herself with the mission report she'd been halfway through doing when Kaidan had first came to her door.

"No, Shepard,"

"Kaidan, don't make me force you out of here,"

"No, dammit! I'm sick of this! Sick of us dancing around each other like 'we' never happened! I get it, Shepard, you've lost a lot. I didn't help, I understand that. You're under a lot of stress but how am I supposed to help you get RID of that stress if you don't let me in?"

"I don't WANT you to help, Alenko! Now get the hell out!"

She sat with her back to him, hunched over her desk with a datapad in hand. She hid it well but Kaidan could tell by the slight twitching of her shoulders and the ever so quiet hitch in her breathing that her resolve had finally broken.

"I…I want to pick up our pieces, Shepard. I still love you. Shit, I think I always will. If it means we can have another shot together, I can look past what happened between you—"

"Oh, that's so GENEROUS of you, Major," Shepard interrupted him snidely, shaking her head viciously as she did. "I'm glad you're willing to look past this atrocity I committed,"

"Stop it, Athena,"

That was the first time Kaidan had ever used her first name. It felt foreign on his lips like a language he shouldn't know how to speak. It shocked him to hear it slip off his tongue but a warm feeling spread through his body followed shortly after. He realised that he wanted to be the only one to call her by that beautiful name. That Horizon, Cerberus, and Project Lazarus didn't mean a damned thing anymore. The Reapers could roll in tomorrow and kill them all if they really wanted to. If this was his last day alive, he didn't want to spend it without her or worse; at her throat.

"When the fuck did I give you permission to call me by that name?" Shepard growled; low and thick with warning.

"You didn't, but I don't want to know you as 'Shepard, humanitys last hope'. I want to know you as Athena; the woman behind Commander Shepard. Trust me,"

"Talking about trust is rich, coming from you,"

They were getting nowhere. He couldn't kiss her; she'd probably break all of his teeth if he tried. He didn't want to touch her with his biotics at the moment. The last thing either of them needed right now is him hurting her physically as well as emotionally. So, he did the only thing that came to mind. He walked up to her desk and leaned against it beside her chair; saying nothing, doing nothing.

"What are you doing, Kaidan?" Shepard sighed heavily, only just sparing him a watery glance from the corner of her eye.

"Talking my way out of this won't work, so I'll wait. I can be patient, Athena,"

"You have a long wait ahead of you then,"

"You're letting me call you 'Athena'. Right now, that's all I need,"

Shepard didn't say anything more but she didn't chase him away either. Neither said a word for hours until it was late into the night and Shepard's clerical work was finally done. It was only then under the pale blue light of the fish tank did Kaidan properly see the dark circles under Shepard's eyes and the lines of worry permanently creasing her forehead. She was breaking under everything that she had been expected to take upon her shoulders.

"Kaidan,"

"Hmm?"

"You're a colossal idiot,"

Kaidan just smiled and nodded, daring to rest a comforting hand on her weary shoulder.

"Yes, ma'am,"

"I'm not apologising for anything,"

"I won't ask you to. I was out of line,"

"Damned straight you were, Alenko. Don't do that again,"

"I wouldn't dream of it,"

Shepard just nodded and pushed herself to her feet. She looked like a dead woman walking as she hobbled over to her bed, collapsing onto it with a resigned sigh. Kaidan followed and sat on the opposite side of the bed but didn't dare to help her get comfortable. She wasn't a child; she could do that herself. Sure enough, soon she'd crawled up to rest her head on the pillow and was then asleep without so much as a minutes notice. She barely noticed Kaidan shuffle in beside her. She saw him sleeping there beside her plain as day when she awoke the next morning though.

'_Perhaps,'_ She thought. _'I should leave this one down to chance,'_

And then she lay down again, tucked her head in underneath her Majors, and slept.


End file.
